Donald Trump couldn’t close out 2024 without taking one last swipe at his sworn enemy “woke Disney.” This time it took the form of revisionist-history praise for Marvel Entertainment’s former chairman Isaac Perlmutter, the president-elect’s long-time mega-donor, political ally, and shadow advisor. “The guy went from stone-cold broke to owning Disney,” Trump told supporters at his private Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida. “Then he got out of Disney because they went woke. He didn’t want woke Donald Duck.” Sylvester Stallone, who was standing next to Perlmutter, seemed to laugh along with the crowd. After gaining control of a flailing Marvel in the 1990s, Perlmutter, 80, sold the company to Disney in 2009 for $4 billion in a deal that allowed him to continue overseeing Marvel properties. But following a major restructuring in 2015, he was laid off in March 2023 as a part of a move aimed at cutting $5.5 billion in costs, Reuters reported. Perlmutter later told the Wall Street Journalhe was fired, not laid off. He had clashed with creative executives and sided with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis during his anti-woke crusade against the company. Last year, Trump blamed DeSantis for failing to reign in “woke” Disney. But when it comes to his pal Perlmutter, he’s apparently going with the classic, “She didn’t dump him; he dumped her.”
